Dakota-Lakota Sioux Language

Dakota and Lakota are Siouan languages of the Great Plains.
They are so closely related that most linguists consider them dialects of the same language, similar to the difference between British and American English.
There are some differences in pronunciation, but they are very regular, and Dakota and Lakota Indians can almost always
understand each other. The Nakota languages--Stoney and
Assiniboine--are also closely related languages but a
Dakota or Lakota Sioux speaker cannot easily understand them without language lessons, similar to the difference between Spanish and Portuguese. There
are a combined 26,000 speakers of Lakota and Dakota Sioux in the western United States and southern Canada, especially in their namesake
states of North and South Dakota.